Author's note: This adventure takes place three months after the awakening of the Deepwater Black's crew.
"I'm waking them now." Lise said. Taking a stimulator up from the tray of medical utensils, she firmly placed the object to the first specimen's arm. She pressed the button, administering the anti-depressant into the body.
"Are you sure? Their intelligence has not fully matured yet," Gret answered. She closely passed the full incubators. The enforced glass steamed and cleared with the other bodies' breathes.
Gen shimmered to life, emitting a sound like glass shattering. Lise and Gret swung around to face the AI. "Estimated time until the hostile alien ship's arrival is four minutes."
"We have to hurry." Lise said.
"I can only promise they'll know what their primary mission is. That's all," Gret said.
Then she tapped her wrist communicator. "Zak: Do you have the fighters on-line?"
In the cramped shuttle bay the orange-haired engineer Zak worked frantically on the last small fighter, a mysterious black one. His red suit was covered with grime and fuel, as he laid under it on a anti-grav board. He tapped his wrist comm as he slid out from under the moderately small 'titan'.
"Ready as they'll ever be. They should hold up enough...by the way, I had to scrounge for resources. The two shuttles are inoperative. I'll find replacement parts for them later."
On the med-bay, specimen alpha's eyes twitched as did his fingers.
"He's waking." Lise said.
Over next to her, the other three specimen's moved. "So are these guys."
"Enemy ship coming into weapons range." Bren said over the comm from the bridge.
Suddenly, as the ship shook violently from the first few hits on the Deepwater Black, Alpha awoke. He sat up with his eyes shot wide. Then he spoke his first words in a serious monotone: "The ship is in danger."
Near Gret, the others sat up, almost emotionless and unphased from the sleep. "We must assist." They said in an eerie unison.
The brown-haired, muscular alpha merely slipped on a set of fatigues from the storage locker on, as did the others. Then, within genetically programmed routine, they ran to the lift.
Lise and Gret stared at each other in awe, mouths gaping. Lise spoke first. "Good programming."
Gret grabbed the collar flaps of the wrap-around DWB blazer. "I try." She gloated with a cheek-to-cheek smile.
"Shields have taken serious damage. I'm diverting to auxilary power," Zak said, tapping the console frantically.
"Bren, where are those damned pilots!?" Reb, commander of the Deepwater Black asked.
Bren took a brief break from the weapons controls to access the internal sensor scan. "They're launching right now."
"Take us back; not too far. If the fighters break down I don't want more of a crisis on our hands then we already have." Reb commanded.
"Aye commander." The short black-haired Yuna acknowledged.
Bren, a tactical genius of sorts, redirected power. "I'm taking thirty percent of weapon's power and diverting it to shields and engines."
The small fighters launched themselves eagerly from the Deepwater Black. The Hostile's manuevers right then resembled something of a puzzled look.
Inside the black fighter, Alpha spoke: "Beta, report in."
Beta was another brown-haired specimen, although he was more aggressive and strict. "Who programmed to put you in charge?"
Ceti and Delta, who were black and blonde haired, agreed with Alpha: "I think Alpha should be in command." Ceti said.
"Affirmative." Delta agreed.
"Alright...for now!" Beta shouted, growling. His fighter, a dark silver-chrome colored fighter, like the rest save Alpha's, formed on the black one's wing.
As soon as everything was in order, the flight was one klick away from the Hostile.
Alpha began the roll call. "Report!"
"Beta Two ready and charged."
"Ceti Three born fighting."
"Delta Four willing and able."
"Break and attack!" Black One shouted. His fighter panned upward toward the bottom of the Hostile vessel's central core pylon, charging and letting loose his laser cannon. The vessel fired few many shots, all of them missing the small attack shuttles as they split away.
Crimson Two's fighter shot closely through the designed technological hull. While doing so, he armed his laser and fired a powerful round, devastating the hull to a point of severe, dark scarring damage.
Ceti's fighter tagged Black One, firing at any weapon emitter's targeting his leader.
Delta's intimidatingly fast fighter swung around, not in cowardice, but to mildly escort the Deepwater while she herself made some passing assaults.
The enemy ship was now black; scarred away from it's mysterious green hue. It was now rolling of it's positional axis, probably from loss of navigational control.
Gret monitored communications. "The ship is sending some sort of distress call."
The aggressive Bren commented. "Destroy it! There will be more ships arriving if they learn of our position!"
Reb looked at Yuna for a notification. Yuna nodded her head. "You have my say Bren. Fire at will." Then Reb addressed Gret. "Tell the pilots to come in and report to the war room."
The Deepwater dragged on slowly as the fighters were tractored in. Meanwhile, as the Hostile drifted aimlessly disabled, the freighter fired everything she had at it. An aurora of bright light and destruction erupted, hitting the DWB mildly.
A half-an-hour later, after preliminary repairs were made, the crew plus the new pilots met. The crew welcomed themselves to their "kids" and discussed other things. Lise began first, only to be interrupted by Alpha.
"What is my name? It cannot be Alpha." He paused for a long moment, then spoke again. "What are all of our names?"
Bren answered. "You have no names...at least not for now."
"Why?" Crimson Two asked.
Gret spoke. "You are supported by a multitude of genetic samples. Over three hundred, to be in the ballpark. The question is: Which one is dominate? The donor would then be your name for now."
Automatically with little complication, Beta found his name. "My name is...Brandon. Brandon McKown."
Ceti answered also: "My name is Manuel...Prieto."
Delta came in third. "And mine is Adam Keylor."
Finally, Black answered. "I am their leader, Bruce Tannock."
Reb was glad. "Well. I guess I found out which one is my son."
Tannock was shocked. The punk commander named Reb looked the same as him!
"What do you mean: son?"
Gret explained. "When we created you to help protect us from the Hostiles, we picked your traits or genetic samples in order to match yourselves to your chosen task.
"The present crew, us, decided to give a little of ourselves to the next generation. Reb's samples our present in you, Bruce. Bren and Zak are part of Brandon. And for a little mystery, we chose the most aggressive, clever and brave known pilot samples we had in our banks for Manuel and Adam."